Photo by Jim Tate Lance Tykwinski is the golf course superintendent at the Marshall Golf Club

The way Lance Tykwinski sees it, being the golf course superintendent at the Marshall Golf Club isn’t too far removed from being a farmer.

Tykwinski is in his fifth year as the MGC superintendent. An Ivanhoe native, he grew up on a Century Farm near Ivanhoe, and his father Mike both farmed and was in the golf business as a superintendent in Hendricks, Tyler, Arizona, and Pipestone before retiring. It’s only natural Tykwinski would gravitate in that direction.

He’s in his fifth year as superintendent at the Marshall course, one of the most beautiful and challenging courses in southwest Minnesota. He was superintendent in Tyler for 14 years before coming to Marshall, and the experience he brought to the job has benefitted the golf course membership and the golf community in the region.

His work has has been noticed. He was named the 2020 18-hole Superintendent of the Year by the South Dakota Chapter of the Golf Course Superintendents Association of America. It’s a group of superintendents along the state line of South Dakota and Minnesota.

It’s Tykwinski’s job to keep the course in shape during the year, and so much of that depends on variables like weather, equipment, and, more recently, the spread of Emerald ash borer throughout the course.

“As the superintendent you wear a lot of hats,” he said. “You want to make sure the course has good playing conditions. You have your daily routines, and there’s also a lot of curve balls, things like weather, equipment breaks, irrigation breaks. Weather is the biggest driving factor.”

He takes direction from the MGC board, and one of the first things he was charged with was to take down three ash trees that were in the center of the fairway in front of the green on the par-3 fourth hole.

“Before the snow had melted, I had them dropped,” he said.

There’s a lot of tree-cutting ahead of him. Emerald ash borer has infected the ash trees at MGC and there are 1,300 of them that will be taken down, “a third of the trees on the course,” he said. “The biggest change (to the general public) will be the way the course looks from Country Club Drive.”

The trees will be replaced, eventually. The priority now, he said, is cutting them down.

MGC features bent grass tee boxes, fairways and greens, a grass unique to courses in the area. It’s a shorter grass, he said, with a tighter surface area.

“It takes a lot of work,” he said. “You have a pesticide program, fertilizer and water. It likes water.”

“It does not take a lot of fertilizer, like bluegrass; it doesn’t need a lot of nitrogen, you have to spoon-feed it small amounts.”

The bent grass seed used at MGC comes from Idaho. “It’s the grass seed state,” he said.

All 18 holes at the course are irrigated and the water comes from the Redwood River, which meanders through the course. MGC is allotted a certain amount of water during the golf season by the DNR. The greens, he said, “are the highest maintenance, and the highest priority.”

Tykwinski is appreciative of the variety of his job and the support from the board and membership.

“I like being outdoors, and we have good membership here, they are good supporters and I’ve gotten to know many over the years, and call them friends.”

He points to members pooling their money to purchase a “debris vac” that has cut his course clean-up time considerably. “The members bought it,” he explained. “It looks like a round baler, with a stock-chopper head,” he said, reverting to his roots and farmer-talk.

“We can clean up in the spring in two days, and it used to be two months, hand-raking, and countless hours.”

He’s also appreciative of the equipment that’s continually being upgraded.

“We’ve got five new pieces of equipment from last fall to now,” he said.

That new equipment, as you’d expect, means more technology. “There’s a lot more computers involved; you’ll get an error code, and have to go to the manual to figure it out. We’re fortunate to have such good equipment, it’s helped me do my job faster, and better.”

MGC employs a dozen part-time individuals during the season, and they show up faithfully each day. “I rely on their help — they’re a great group to work with,” he said.

When Tykwinskii graduated high school he stopped farming, but, he admits, “it’s in the blood.” He returned to the land a year ago and farms 110 acres on the 140-year-old family home site, where he lives with his wife, Alicia, and sons Grant, 7; Trevor, 5; and Jasper, 4 months. His return to farming was driven by his upbringing, and his look to the future for his sons.

The addition of farming makes the fall months especially busy. “There’s farming, and I help a neighbor farm, and the golf course. It’s a lot of work, and a lot of hours.”

In the winter months he maintains equipment and sharpens mower reels for a number of area courses. It’s also a time to take a breath, take some time off, and plan for the next golf season.

He enjoys fishing and hunting, and with three sons growing up, it’s safe to say they’ll inherit those outdoor interests, too. “I like to deer hunt, and in the winter, ice fish,” he said.

He’s never quite sure what each day will bring, but those are the challenges most enjoyed by course superintendents, and farmers. Coincidentally, Tykwinski is both.